Instagram is preparing a criticized feature: it will allow you to see the location of your friends in real time – AINA

If you want to always know where your friends are and what they are doing, you will be delighted with the upcoming innovation of the social network Instagram. The developers of the platform have confirmed that they will soon introduce the feature “Friend Map”, which will allow you to see where your friends are in real time. According to Justina Antropik, head of content for Tele2’s digital channels, although other platforms have previously offered similar options, some users may be concerned about their privacy.

It happened in the market before

Meta, the company behind photo and video sharing platform Instagram, has confirmed that it is developing a Friend Map feature. This friends map will allow you to see the current location of all your friends, as well as leave short messages or notes that are visible to everyone. True, this is not the first case where people using the same platform or devices can share their location with each other.

“This feature is similar to Snapchat’s Snap Map feature, which also lets you see where your friends are right now.” A similar tool has already been available to iPhone owners – they have the Find My feature, which allows you to see the location of paired devices. “Instagram will allow you not only to share your location, but also to leave messages, for example, about a restaurant you visited or a store you were interested in,” says Mr. Antropik.

According to the expert, Instagram has been taking measures to improve the map offered in its app for some time. in 2022 At the end of 2016, the company introduced a search map that allowed users to explore places tagged in photos and filter location results by specific categories, such as restaurants, coffee shops, and beauty salons.

“Young users of the platform are more likely to use apps like Instagram and TikTok than Google search or maps to find new places. It can be said that with this new feature, Instagram wants to give its users another reason to spend more time in this app than in other apps,” observes J. Antropik.

According to the company, this new feature is still under development and not yet available to users. It has not yet been announced when it will be available for testing.

Concern for privacy

Admittedly, this feature may raise privacy concerns for some users. Is it always safe to share your location with others? In particular, Instagram’s friend map would allow users to choose who can see their location, according to Mr. Antropik.

“It looks like users will be able to choose which followers to share their location with.” For example, only with those you follow yourself and they follow you, or only with the list of closest friends from Close Friends, or with nothing at all. The map would also have a Ghost Mode setting that would hide your last active location,” notes Tele2’s head of digital content.

Location data would also be further protected by end-to-end encryption, according to Instagram’s developers. This means that they would not be accessible to third parties.